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India's first entertainment theme park will be launched on Thursday near Mumbai with a series of rides based on Bollywood films, Hindu Gods, Mughal forts and a dubious subcontinental dinosaur - and not a single Hollywood cartoon character in sight.
Adlabs Imagica, spread over 300 acres on a site between India's film and commerce capital and the retirement town of Pune, is India's answer to Disney's recent statement that the iconic Hollywood brand would never build a theme park in India because the country's infrastructure was not yet ready to meet its standards.
Indian businessman Manmohan Shetty told The Daily Telegraph that Hollywood had no part in his theme park because Indians had very little interest in foreign films.
Only eight per cent of film audiences watched American films, while the overwhelming majority love home-grown Hindi, Tamil, Kannada and Bengali cinema.
His theme park reflects Indians' love of their own culture, he said, with attractions based on the dungeons and legends of Delhi's Mughal-period Salimgarh Fort, a bumpy car ride mimicking the adventures of the Bollywood superhero from the cult 1987 film Mr India with Anil Kapoor, who starred in Slumdog Millionaire.
Other rides include one themed on Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves and a river ride named after the fictitious Indian dinosaur, the Rajasaurus. "We call it the Indian dinosaur, but no-one will question me about something from 15,000 years ago," Mr Shetty said.
"We've started our own theme park as an attraction for middle-class families. In the last ten years we've had shopping malls, multiplex cinemas, international brands, there has been enough disposable income in India, now we have a theme park where people can spend the whole day with their families," he said.
Jonathan Walter, a former Gurkha officer who started the Flying Fox zip ride adventure company in India in 2009, said the new theme park and the success of his own firm reflects the rise of the Indian middle class which has money in its pockets but still too few places to go.
He now has four Flying Fox attractions in Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, and said he is amazed at the distances visitors will travel for a good day out.
"People will drive three hours each way for a day of fun. It's India's Facebook generation, they put their videos of it on YouTube and Facebook, look cool in front of their mates instead of just hanging out in a shopping mall. The whole market is really taking off in India," he said.
Make way for the Rajasaurus: India launches its first theme park (with not a Disney character in sight) - Telegraph
Adlabs Imagica, spread over 300 acres on a site between India's film and commerce capital and the retirement town of Pune, is India's answer to Disney's recent statement that the iconic Hollywood brand would never build a theme park in India because the country's infrastructure was not yet ready to meet its standards.
Indian businessman Manmohan Shetty told The Daily Telegraph that Hollywood had no part in his theme park because Indians had very little interest in foreign films.
Only eight per cent of film audiences watched American films, while the overwhelming majority love home-grown Hindi, Tamil, Kannada and Bengali cinema.
His theme park reflects Indians' love of their own culture, he said, with attractions based on the dungeons and legends of Delhi's Mughal-period Salimgarh Fort, a bumpy car ride mimicking the adventures of the Bollywood superhero from the cult 1987 film Mr India with Anil Kapoor, who starred in Slumdog Millionaire.
Other rides include one themed on Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves and a river ride named after the fictitious Indian dinosaur, the Rajasaurus. "We call it the Indian dinosaur, but no-one will question me about something from 15,000 years ago," Mr Shetty said.
"We've started our own theme park as an attraction for middle-class families. In the last ten years we've had shopping malls, multiplex cinemas, international brands, there has been enough disposable income in India, now we have a theme park where people can spend the whole day with their families," he said.
Jonathan Walter, a former Gurkha officer who started the Flying Fox zip ride adventure company in India in 2009, said the new theme park and the success of his own firm reflects the rise of the Indian middle class which has money in its pockets but still too few places to go.
He now has four Flying Fox attractions in Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, and said he is amazed at the distances visitors will travel for a good day out.
"People will drive three hours each way for a day of fun. It's India's Facebook generation, they put their videos of it on YouTube and Facebook, look cool in front of their mates instead of just hanging out in a shopping mall. The whole market is really taking off in India," he said.
Make way for the Rajasaurus: India launches its first theme park (with not a Disney character in sight) - Telegraph
